Beauty Basics: The Bad Stuff

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Deciphering the back of a beauty bottle can be like trying to understand a foreign language sans interpreter. With the unpronounceable terms and mystery ingredients, it's easy to feel lost. Unfortunately, not knowing what you're putting on your skin and hair has risks: The FDA doesn't approve personal-care products, and many contain elements that may pose health problems. To make matters worse, it's not just the ingredients in isolation that pose a problem. "We don't know how things work together," says Anne Marie Fine, M.D., a Scottsdale, Arizona-based naturopathic skin specialist, "or what the total effect from all the products we use every day will be." While you can't expect to avoid the bad stuff completely, you can get good at scanning labels for red-flag terms. With Fine's help, we identified eight common questionable ingredients. Keep these on your hit list, and start choosing healthier products.

1. Disodium Laureth Sulfosuccinate (DLS)What It IsA chemical salt

What it DoesLowers water's surface tension, which lets products spread out and penetrate more easily; boosts foaming action

Why Avoid?It can produce harmful byproducts such as 1,4- dioxane and ethylene oxide, two chemicals linked to cancer.

Why Avoid?Petrolatum forms a film on your skin to prevent moisture from escaping. Unfortunately, that film also traps toxins under the skin (your largest organ) and keeps it from breathing properly. This can clog pores and interfere with skin's excretory function (i.e., sweating) and cell development.